Kevin McLaughlin

Left back Daniel Lafferty is hoping to finish the campaign in positive fashion with both his teams – Burnley and Rotherham United - staying in their respective leagues.

The Clarets currently sit just in the relegation zone in the Premier League and United are six points clear of the relegation zone in the Championship.

The ex-Derry City man, who has just extended his loan deal with Rotherham until the end of the season, remains hopeful of getting more action time in the Premier League this season.

“I just extended my deal with Rotherham until the end of the season and I’m happy enough with that, because I have played all three games and it also gives Burnley a 24-hour recall and it’s also in their best interests that I’m out playing football and getting game time,” he stated.

“So from that point of view this move to Rotherham is working out well for both parties.

“An ideal season for me would be that both Burnley and Rotherham stay up and then I would be looking towards pre-season to try and be competitive in terms of getting back into the Burnley squad.

“I have still have another two years left at Burnley after this season, so the manager obviously values me, because they don’t just hand out three year contracts for the sake of it, so I’m looking to finish the season as well as I can because there is a slight gap when the Championship season finishes and the Premier League season ends, so there’s a small opportunity for me to play again for Burnley this season, but a more realistic opportunity for me is to look towards next season.”

Lafferty, who along with the Northern Ireland squad met IBF World Super Bantamweight champion Carl Frampton this week, who came off the bench against Southampton in December also played for Sean Dyche’s men in their FA Cup draw against Tottenham Hotspur again at Turf Moor.

“Hopefully Burnley can stay in the Premier League, so that I get the opportunity of playing those big teams and big players, I only had a small taste of it this season, coming on as substitute and playing in an FA Cup tie, but that has given me a little taste of what could be possible.

“It’s every young footballers dream to play in the Premier League and it has been kind of surreal this season because it has been so close, but yet so far as I haven’t been in the team.

Hopefully Burnley can stay in the Premier League, so that I get the opportunity of playing those big teams and big players

“Obviously being a team like Burnley which has been very competitive for places, even though the squad is small the manager doesn’t really make many changes, but even though I have very lack of game time this season I haven’t been too disheartened.

“Yes it has been frustrating and I have had to very patient this year and hope for a bit of luck, but that luck hasn’t happened, so I have to try and finish the season as well as I can and hopefully the staff and manager at Burnley will see that and it might help my case when I go back to the club.

“I had been in pretty much every Burnley squad this season and it has been a fine line from making the final match day squad and I have been on the bench a lot of games this season, so it’s not like the manager isn’t having me at all it’s just the way it is in football.

“Sometimes when everyone is fighting for a place in the squad and when they get it they fight even harder to keep it, so it’s hard to get yourself in front of somebody.

“But I haven’t been completely out of the frame at Burnley this season and the manager has told me that he values me.”